Ecosystem

An ecosystem is a biological relationship between different organisms and their environment. For example, a simple ecosystem might comprise plants growing in the soil, insects feading on the plants, birds feeding on the insects and earthworms feeding on the remains of the dead birds and returning the nutrients to the soil.

Ecosystems are often studied by focusing on three areas:

• Individual organisms
• Populations of organisms
• The interactions between different species of organism

A photograph of an adult damselfly eating an aphid. Ecosystems focus on these types of inter-species interaction.

Related terms

• Biodiversity
• Carnivore
• Conservation
• Detritivore
• Ecology
• Herbivore
• Omnivore

Related groups of terms

• General biology

See other words beginning with E